Channeling the influences of the local Polverigian architecture while evoking the experimentations of the Italian radical avant-garde, Border Crossing House by Simone Subissati Architects inhabits the rural landscape with a commanding presence that can’t be ignored. Set on a ridge between the city and the countryside, the home is so closely surrounded by cultivated fields that it’s practically a part of it.

The two-storey home’s levels are distinguished from each other by color, the ground floor with a deep red coating and the upper floor in white. Rectangular in length, a large portion of the central volume is left open, enclosed by large sections of metal columns, allowing inhabitants a breath of the outdoors when crossing from one end to the other. Windows open directly onto the outside space, uniting the living room, kitchen and spa with the outdoors. A lovely swimming pool, placed perpendicular to the house, mirrors the facade of the home on its calm surface.

Speaking more about the project, Subissati says, “For the Border Crossing House I imagined a space that would as if it was ‘inherited.’ I wanted it to be the least opulent it could be: it is meant to feel ‘as if it had always been there’ though being contemporary and in many ways very distant from tradition … A space without frills and without luxury, just like the buildings of the rural tradition where people both lived and worked.”

See more of the studio’s work on their website.

Photography © Alessandro Magi Galluzzi for Simone Subissati Architects